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Andrea, Esq., Lawyer

Category: Employment Law

Satisfied Customers: 12358

Experience: 25 yrs. of experience in employment law, real estate and business law, family law, criminal defense and immigration.

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Andrea, Esq. is online now

I resigned from my accounting position after I was removed

Resolved Question:

I resigned from my accounting position after I was removed from my previous duties of 6 years of working with Mortgagees without any warning or explanation. I was kept in the same department at the same rate of pay but now I was working on budget modifications. I had to train my replacement and listen to everything that was going on without being able to actually assist my former clients. This was extremely stressful for me. I did file a grievance against the Treasurer and am still waiting for a decision on that. I have been denied UI benefits. I felt that harassment and discrimination applied to my case. Do I have a legal basis for appeal? The State is Wisconsin.

My name is XXXXX XXXXX my goal is to provide you with excellent service today. I am sorry to hear of your difficult situation. Before I can give you an accurate answer to your question, please provide the following additional information:

On what basis do you believe you were discriminated against, based on your race, gender, age, disability, or something else? Did the employer violate a contract you had with them or violate their own policies in some manner by putting you in this position? Was the employer going to terminate your employment or leave you in the reassigned position?

I look forward to assisting you as soon as I have received this information. Thank you.

I worked for a WI Native American Indian Tribe. I started as a bookkeeper at a location 30 miles from my home. A year ago they moved my position to a location 60 miles from my home. I was offered a new position of Jr Accountant with this transfer working with mortgages or I would be out of a job. The stress of this drive alone was hard. Then the Head of the department appointed a new Director over my position. She had no experience with mortgages and I was the only one left that knew the procedures. During the Escrow analysis process she wanted to make changes that were against the FDIC rules covering the escrow. I objected and finally convinced her to do them the correct way. After that I was removed from my position. I was basically fired from my job. There are a lot of things going on here. I did not feel I could file a grievance at that time because of the very high importance of their positions. I did contact an investgator in the personnell dept prior to my leaving. I found the appointed Director did step down from that position but still was in charge of mortgages. I had given almost 2 months notice before I left. I guess I was hoping things would change back. My new Director asked me to stay on and I told her I would. Then the Dept head refused to let me stay - I feel because of the investigation. It is a real mess. The botXXXXX XXXXXne for me was I loved my job with mortgages and was willing to drive the 60 miles one way to work. I was not willing to drive that far to be continually stressed out over the changes that were occuring from a person that knew nothing about mortgages.

I am going to opt out of your question and open this up for other professionals to get their opinion. You do not have to stay online for the question to be active, or rate this question yet as it would then discourage others from answering. Should a professional pick it up, you should be alerted via email and/or SMS (text message) unless you actively disable these features.

There is no need for you to reply at this time as this may "lock" your question back to me, thus inadvertently delaying a response from someone else.

I am an old (59) white woman working for Native American. I'm not so sure I was discriminated against as much as harressed about my job. I continually had to fight against changes that were tried to be implemented.

I did not have a written contract but when I was transferred from my original dept to the last dept it was implied that I would be doing the same work. Then in March they removed me from those duties.

I resigned - I was not terminated. But after working with a New Director I was asked by her to stay on. I tried to resind my resignation but the Head of the dept would not let me. I checked with personnel and was told it was up to the supervisor - who wanted me to stay but I was not allowed to.

I know how frustrating it can be when you are trying to get a point across, but the other party is just not listening.

1. I mentioned discrimination because you said you thought harassment and discrimination applied to your case. I believe that you have a stronger case for age discrimination than for harassment. It is very possible that the employer had an overall plan to remove the older employees and replace them with younger ones. Your age, although certainly not old, puts you in a protected class and I would go with that,

I do not believe that transferring an employee to another department or assigning the employee different responsibilities is harassment. And, if an employer has certain policies and a certain way of doing things, it is not considered "harassment" in the workplace because the employer does not accept an employee's suggestions. I am sure that you had a lot more experience and a lot more knowledge than the other employee had, but if an employer wants things done a certain way, the employees must comply with the employer's directive;

2. If an employee has a written Employment Agreement with the employer, that Agreement will set forth the employee's responsibilities, in which departments the employee would be placed, benefits, etc. and under what conditions the employee could be terminated. If there is no written Employment Agreement, then there is an "At Will" employment relationship and the employer is free to change the responsibilities of the employee, reassign the employee to other departments, reduce their hours and their salary and can terminate them at any time for any reason or no reason. The employer may very well have implied certain things about your responsibilities, reassignments, etc. However, if these ideas were not set forth in writing, the employer was free to make any changes he felt were necessary without incurring any liability to the employee. In an employment relationship, everything must be in writing, because it is very rare that anything is implied which will bind the employer

Because you underlined, "I was basically fired from my job" , I took that literally and that is why I wondered why you thought you were not entitled to Unemployment Compensation benefits.

Being an "At Will" employee, the employer could reassign you to any department and could change your responsibilities without incurring any liability to you. I believe, however, that your were discriminated against because of your age and I believe you have a strong case in that regard. Since this is basically, the only ground that is present, if I were in your position, I would not hesitate or miss the chance to file a formal Complaint (or "charge") against the employer with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission ("EEOC").

I realize that this is not exactly the Answer you were hoping for and it would have given me great pleasure to give you the Answer you wanted to hear, but I have an ethical obligation to you to give you only correct Answers and information, so I am respectfully asking that you not hold Wisconsin law applicable to your situation against me,

If I would not have taken the postion when it was moved to another city in June of 2012 - now a 120 mi round trip per day for me - I would have been unemployed a year earlier. Doesn't that count for anything? I was sent there as part of the department. They moved me and my job and then they took it away.

I will tell you that...the things you have to go through to be an Expert are quite rigorous.

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